And while Willard is on the mind, here is the link to a super essay, "The Unhinging of the American Mind: Derrida as Pretext."  I stumbled onto this essay a little over twenty years ago, I believe.  I found it very helpful.  His basic argument is that universities have ceased to be institutions which are interested in passing on knowledge.

He writes:

The heart of the university crisis is, in my view, the simple fact that its institutional structures and processes are no longer organized around knowledge. The life of knowledge is no longer their telos and substance. Knowledge and knowing is not what is had in view or consciously supported by them. The people in charge are in fact only very rarely thinking about knowledge. It is not what the place "is about" in the mental processes of those who determine, or think they determine, curriculum, program and personnel, what is to count as "good work" or bad, and who is to be rewarded in various ways or not.

Given recent events at various universities, Willard's basic point simply continues to be vindicated.  It is a very good read.

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